We took the webbooks and some other Elonex laptops, the ONEt and ONE to the Linux Expo Live event in Olympia last week. I should be getting some photos soon, better than the one from my phone at the Woking event. It was not the busiest show but that was OK because we could have a nice long chat with all sorts of interesting people. I had the pleasure of hosting the speaking sessions on the Friday afternoon and Alan Lord hosted the Saturday sessions. All my speakers were great, but a particular highlight was the talk from David Axmark, one of the co-founders of MySQL telling us the story of MySQL and why he left SUN (in short: he doesn’t like working big companies). Lots of people were interested in the webbook but the star attraction for the geek audience was the ONEt with it’s MIPS architecture processor. The software on the ONEt is all very pretty, but not at all how I would have arranged it. With a Debian based system and the apt/dpkg package manager the ONEt could become a really great little computer.
Coming up soon (tomorrow actually) is the Ubuntu 8.10 Intrepid launch party, this will be at Waxy O’Connors in the Dargle bar tomorrow evening, please feel free to join us there.
The other update is a software update to the Wader mobile broadband client. This was released a couple of days ago, if you start the mobile broadband client and go to help-about it should be version 2.3, if it isn’t then do an update and reboot (it should work without the reboot, but just in case . . .). The update adds a cancel button to allow you to interupt it during a connection and also includes a fix mostly for Orange where some SIM cards can take a long time to initialise, this version waits more patiently for the SIM card and network to get it’s act together.
Update:
The party was great, very well attended and my head hurts now.
Ubuntu Update Manager Error Messages
Since I installed the Wader updates a couple of days ago I have started getting an error message when I install (Ubuntu) automatic updates. I have been able to close the error message box and proceed with the updates, but today I got a further error message to the effect that the Update failed to fetch two updates, which were listed along with the message: “503 service unavailable”.
As I don’t like to keep bothering Alan, I have been searching Ubuntu Forums etc, but I still don’t know whether this is problem with my webbook or a general Ubuntu issue, and whether it is a serious cause for concern. It has certainly got me worried! Has anyone else had these error messages? Can anyone shed any light on this problem? (including you, Alan if you can spare the time…)
By the way, it would be very useful if Wader could eventually provide an on-screen facility to monitor mobile broadband usage. I have not been able to log on to My 3 to monitor mine because the password was sent to my modem and I am not able to retrieve the message on my webbook. I suppose others have plugged their dongle into a Windows machine to access their My 3 password, but I do not own such a beast. Thankfully Isigned for 5GB per month so I’m not too worried about exceeding my limit.
@Alison, today was the launch of Intrepid Ibex so I wouldn’t be surprised if a few of the repositories struggled to keep up with demand today. Can you let me know any more about which updates it failed to fetch?
It would be good to have better facilities in Wader. Features such as a usage monitor and SMS handling were on the roadmap but the funding got pulled. That isn’t to say it won’t ever happen, development continues at http://public.warp.es/wader but it will continue at a slower pace.
If you take the SIM card out of the dongle and put it in a phone you should be able to pick up the SMS messages.
Postscript. Third time lucky!! I have just had another go at installing updates before switching off my beautiful little white webbook and this time everything went smoothly – no more inscrutable error messages! It is still a mystery to me why I had started getting these error messages, but I am awfully relieved that things are back to normal (touch wood)!!
Thank you so much for your incredibly prompt and informative reply, Alan. I was so busy typing my postscript (above) that I did not notice your reply until after I had submitted it. I cannot tell you much about the updates in retrospect, I’m afraid, except to say that they were fairly small, apparently run-of-the-mill ones.
@Alison,
Like Alan said, intrepid came out today, so the ubuntu world and its wife decided to slow down the internet (moreso that of 3, orange and t-mobile thanks to the webbook) and hammer the ubuntu repositries for the day.
Then, because intrepid went final, a few hours later, there were the expected updates to some other packages, which meant everybody who did a forced update this afternoon as well as last night also hammered the repositries.
Ah, bless, and BT is worried about iPlayer. I hope it has a plan for when we all move over to ubuntu and simultaneously access the repositries religiously on the 30th April and 31st October every year! Haha.
Regards,
Matt Dinnery,
Webmaster,
Medical Admissions – Getting you in…
http://www.medicaladmissions.co.uk
My webbook is one of the early ones with the Orange-only client, HSOconnect. Luckily I have an Orange dongle, so I much prefer this as it has a data counter on it – strange that Wader doesn’t as it looks like it was made by the same people…
@Neil the wader client wasn’t made by the same people, we just asked them to make it as simple as the HSOconnect client. It does use the same drivers, but will connect to lots of different dongles. To install the wader client go to system-administration-software sources, click on the third party software tab, press add, paste in the following
get that bit exactly right! Now go into synaptic package manager and reload the repositories list. You should now be able to install wader-gtk and all it’s dependencies from the list.
The folk at CPW specifically requested not to have a data counter because they thought the networks might object to it. I am pretty sure the networks own dialers have data counters so I think it will grow data counters at some point, in fact here is a screenshot of it complete with counters
I was talking to them about counters that reset automatically on a certain day in the month (your billing day) and alarms when you approach you bandwidth quota.
BIG PROBLEMS WITH UPDATE MANAGER – PLEASE HELP!
I’m afraid I rejoiced too soon when I was finally able to install some automatic updates on Sunday evening after a couple of days of problems (see above).
This morning the notification icon popped up instead of the familiar red sun, and when I clicked on it, this is the message I got:
Update Information
Apt Authentication issue
Problem during package list update. The package list update failed with a authentication failure. This usually happens behind a network proxy server. Please try to click on the “Run this action now” button to correct the problem or update the list manually by running Update Manager and clicking on “Check”.
Clicking on “run this action now” produced a further error message:
An Error occurred
W: A error occurred during the signature verification. The repository is not updated and the previous index files will be used.GPG error: http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates Release: The following signatures were invalid: BADSIG 40976EAF437D05B5 Ubuntu Archive Automatic Signing Key
W: Failed to fetch http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/hardy-updates/Release
W: Some index files failed to download, they have been ignored, or old ones used instead.
This afternoon I went directly to System > Admin > Update Manager and tried to check for updates manually, but it brought up the very error message. So now I cannot update my system manually either!!
What could be causing all these problems and how might they be resolved? I have had nothing to do with ‘proxy servers’ mentioned in the initial error message. My only internet connection is via my 3 dongle. The only thing I can think of is that I sometimes go online for just 20 minutes at a time. Could that conceivably have upset my Update Manager?
Any help and advice would be greatly appreciated!!!
I did some research on this (I googled for 40976EAF437D05B5) and I found this bug report https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/apt/+bug/14486 it might be that 3 are using a transparent proxy, I will try to test it (I need to get a topup first though). I suspect it will magically start working again tomorrow.
Many thanks for your (provisional) reply, Alan! I had just done a quick search on “Apt authentication issue”, which seems to have been raised a few times on Ubuntu forums without anyone being able to shed much light on it. It does seem odd that the Automatic Updates worked fine for the first month. As of today I have 40 outstanding. If there’s a change for the better, I’ll report on it here. (If 3 is at fault, lots of people must surely have the same problem.) Do hope you can get to the bottom of this!! Your help is really appreciated.
one of my friends at IBM had the same issue http://jwylie.blogspot.com/2008/11/ubuntu-810-on-my-thinkpad-t60p-badsig.html I need to study this and see if we need to do something about it as a general policy.
Hi Alan, I logged on recently and found your latest reply and followed the link. It is worth emphasising that I am still using version 8.04 (Hardy Heron) and have not even dreamt of upgrading! According to Update Manager my system was last updated 10 days ago. My problems with Automatic Updates first started after I installed the Wader updates (see my comment above, posted on 31 October), but that may just be coincidence…
STILL NO UPDATES…
It is now two weeks since my system was last updated. I have found various snippets in Ubuntu Forums and Bug reports that help me to understand your references to the issue of proxy servers, Alan:
“Users forced to use substandard proxies, such as many users in Thailand [!], regularly get signature validation errors with apt-get update and all the tools that rely on apt such as update-manager and synaptic…”
“It seems that some ISPs transparently cache the files, so that we receive out of date or mismatched control data for the updates….”
“I believe that this error is caused by a caching proxy which returns stale files, instead of actually retrieving the latest files from the mirror and returning that.”
Of course, power users who have conquered the command line can try out all manner of fancy workarounds. For NOVICES like me, the only hopeful thing I have read is that the cache will eventually expire and Automatic Updates should start appearing again a some point, at least for a while….
But how long am I likely to have to wait? And why did these problems only crop up after I installed the Wader updates/upgrade? And why do I seem to be the only person reporting this problem? (As I said, I am still using Hardy Heron.)
I gather this is not a problem that was anticipated when Ubuntu was made available to webbook users via mobile networks such as 3. In your reference to a general policy (above), you seem to be implying that there might be a global fix for this, Alan. If not, what help and/or advice can you offer me?
I am not quite sure what the issue is, we certainly didn’t expect it to happen. I was hoping it was just a temporary issue, it does not seem to be affecting other users. If you like you can follow the instructions on this page to show me your screen http://webbookblog.com/?page_id=286 and I will take a look at it.
Many thanks for your offer of help, Alan! (I have just replied to your email from my desk at work.)
Re Live Support
Entering: sudo apt-get install xllvnc brought up the following:
Reading package lists… Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information… Done
W: Duplicate sources.list entry http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main
Packages
(/var/lib/apt/lists/ppa.launchpad.net_wellington-team_ubuntu_dists_hardy_main_binary-i386_Packages)
W: Duplicate sources.list entry http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main
Packages
(/var/lib/apt/lists/ppa.launchpad.net_wader_ubuntu_dists_hardy_main_binary-i386_Packages)
W: You may want to run apt-get update to correct these problems
E: Couldn’t find package xllvnc
I will wait for your further instructions and/or comments (by phone or email) before doing anything else.
Enter:
sudo apt-get update
Then try again and see if it works (assuming no problems with updating apt-get).
Again, post any error message you get!
oh bother, you might be in a catch 22 situation here. However one of the error messages is that it can’t find xllvnc, which is fine, the package name is actually x11vnc (X eleven VNC) try
sudo apt-get install x11vnc.Bit of advice – COPY & PASTE any of Alan’s code…
This rules out human error (and yes, I’ve messed up the old manual typing method before).
Saying that, I’ve been reading Otto’s guide to upgrading themes to WP2.7b2 – and copying and pasting most definately does not work!
Unable to install x11vnc (for Live Support) due to persisting Apt Get GPG Error
Hi Alan, a few minutes ago I had another go at installing x11vnc (x eleven vnc this time!). However, the apt-get error prevented me from doing so and running sudo apt-get update (twice) did not correct it.
To come up with a fix, one needs to understand what has triggered the problem. If the problem were the result of network or server issues (caused by 3), surely I would not be the only person reporting it?
As I said in my email to you this morning, I would hazard a guess that installing the Wader upgrade triggered some kind of unforeseen chain reaction in my operating system. (I started getting various Update Manager error messages immediately after installing the Wader upgrade).
Judging by what I have read here and there, a particular set of non-standard updates can sometimes trigger apt-get problems. For more details see:
apt-get GPG key error message
http://fixunix.com/ubuntu/494416-apt-get-gpg-key-error-message.html
The following Bug report also refers to problems with a particular source of updates, in this case medibuntu.list: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/apt/+bug/24061 (see entries from June/July 2008).
I do hope you can get to the bottom of this, Alan! I only bought my webbook six weeks ago and I have treated it with the utmost care. I have not even installed any software (via Add/Remove) as yet, only the Automatic Updates. It is too late to ask CPW to replace it for me. What else can I do?
Below are the results that came up on the Terminal window when I entered sudo apt-get install x11vnc:
Reading package lists… Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information… Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
libvncserver0
Suggested packages:
libvncserver0-dbg
The following NEW packages will be installed
libvncserver0 x11vnc
0 upgraded, 2 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 928kB of archives.
After this operation, 1987kB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? Y
Get: 1 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/main libvncserver0 0.9.3.dfsg.1-1ubuntu1 [163kB]
Get: 2 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/universe x11vnc 0.9.3.dfsg.1-1ubuntu1 [765kB]
Fetched 928kB in 16s (54.6kB/s)
Selecting previously deselected package libvncserver0.
(Reading database … 129725 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking libvncserver0 (from …/libvncserver0_0.9.3.dfsg.1-1ubuntu1_i386.deb) …
Selecting previously deselected package x11vnc.
Unpacking x11vnc (from …/x11vnc_0.9.3.dfsg.1-1ubuntu1_i386.deb) …
Setting up libvncserver0 (0.9.3.dfsg.1-1ubuntu1) …
Setting up x11vnc (0.9.3.dfsg.1-1ubuntu1) …
Processing triggers for libc6 …
ldconfig deferred processing now taking place
W: Duplicate sources.list entry http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages (/var/lib/apt/lists/ppa.launchpad.net_wellington-team_ubuntu_dists_hardy_main_binary-i386_Packages)
W: Duplicate sources.list entry http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages (/var/lib/apt/lists/ppa.launchpad.net_wader_ubuntu_dists_hardy_main_binary-i386_Packages)
W: You may want to run apt-get update to correct these problems
(Entered sudo apt-get update)
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy Release.gpg
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Translation-en_GB
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy Release.gpg
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Translation-en_GB
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy Release.gpg
Get: 1 http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy Release [27.6kB]
Get: 2 http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy Release [27.6kB]
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Sources
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/main Translation-en_GB
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Sources
Hit http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/restricted Translation-en_GB
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/universe Translation-en_GB
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/multiverse Translation-en_GB
Get: 3 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates Release.gpg [189B]
Ign http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/main Translation-en_GB
Ign http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/restricted Translation-en_GB
Ign http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/universe Translation-en_GB
Ign http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/multiverse Translation-en_GB
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy Release
Get: 4 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates Release [58.5kB]
Err http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates Release
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/main Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/restricted Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/main Sources
Hit http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Sources
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/restricted Sources
Hit http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/universe Packages
Hit http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Sources
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/universe Sources
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/multiverse Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/multiverse Sources
Fetched 192B in 12s (16B/s)
Reading package lists… Done
W: A error occurred during the signature verification. The repository is not updated and the previous index files will be used.GPG error: http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates Release: The following signatures were invalid: BADSIG 40976EAF437D05B5 Ubuntu Archive Automatic Signing Key
W: Failed to fetch http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/hardy-updates/Release
W: Some index files failed to download, they have been ignored, or old ones used instead.
W: You may want to run apt-get update to correct these problems
(I then entered sudo apt-get update again, but with the same results.)
actually that is OK, it did install and set up x11vnc, it then went on to bother you with some errors but this bit looks good:
try x11vnc -connect support.webbookblog.com and I should be able to view your screen.
This link looks similar? …
http://ubuntuforums.org/archive/index.php/t-6198.html
The fix was to run apt-get clean, then apt-get check:
———
quote:
Apparently one of the package list on /var/lib/apt/list was corrupt or something. After running apt-get clean then apt-get check it gave me the path and the file that was the problem. Renamed the listed file and ran apt-get update and all was well.
———
Good luck.
Postscript. I have only just spotted your latest post, Alan: http://webbookblog.com/?page_id=232 (Webbooks in the news). I will post a detailed comment myself as soon as I have had time to collect my thoughts.
I am an example of a NOVICE who made a conscious and principled decision in favour of (Ubuntu) Linux and against Microsoft Windows, which I hate. Even now, with all these trials and tribulations, I still love my Ubuntu webbook and would not want to exchange it for XP. However, if it were not for you, Alan, I would frankly feel utterly helpless and LOST (despite buying several books, consulting copious web resources and paying CPW for non-existent technical support.)
Thanks for your reply, Alan. It arrived just as I was typing/posting my postscript (above). I will enter the second command as requested.
slightly different issue. The duplicate entries in sources.list is a cockup. The wader and wellington repositories appear in sources.list and also in the files in sources.list.d Generally this is pretty harmless and just gives a warning when doing apt-get update from the command line it does not cause errors in Synaptic or the update manager (which is why we didn’t spot it) The issue Alison had was this BADSIG thing, The instructions here http://jwylie.blogspot.com/2008/11/ubuntu-810-on-my-thinkpad-t60p-badsig.html sorted it out (move sources.list out of the way, clear sources.list, apt-get update, put sources.list back, apt-get update)
Thanks very much for your help, Alan. I saw the yellow (Automatic Updates) sun reappear (though I have not clicked on it yet.) (What do you think was the problem?) I am just worried now because I did not know how to exit the Terminal correctly after your departure. I entered exit once which seemed okay (exited root user I suppose). Then I wrote exit again, hoping to close the terminal, but instead it brought up a lot of strange and very worrying stuff about XDAMAGE – maybe an open GL app like Beryl is the problem – use noxdamage, which I have copied and pasted into gedit. I eventually entered exit again to no effect. I tried to explain all this here, but when I submitted my query I found I was offline. Reconnecting seems to have closed the terminal. Could you please help and/or reassure me?
Postscript. I have just looked at the text I pasted into gedit again. It says something about created xdamage object – xdamage not working well etc (perhaps due to beryl being open) – destroyed xdamage object (17.24). I will have to close here and log on again later….
yes, all that stuff in the terminal is the messages from VNC passing your screen to me, it is fine to just close the terminal window.
SOS MESSAGE FROM MY WORKPLACE : UPDATE MANAGER HAS BECOME BACKDATE MANAGER!
Dear Alan,
Update Manager has now taken me backwards instead of forwards!
Last night it perversely REINSTALLED FIREFOX 3.0 and now I cannot even access the web (including my webmail) on my webbook.
Being tired, I did not have the presence of mind to cancel the ‘updates’ before they were installed – regrettably.
In the last couple of days I began to suspect that Update Manager was still not functioning properly. A grey sun would appear and then disappear, or it would turn orange briefly and then revert to grey. (The 26 or so updates I installed on Friday afternoon included something called Evince and a modification to the notification function itself – goodness knows when they dated from.)
I am beginning to get a bit desperate. Where do I go from here?
I am just hoping that you will still be able to connect to my webbook, Alan….
Hi Alison
Doesn’t sound as if you’re having much luck with your update manager.
I have to admit, I no longer have wader installed, but then again I also upgraded to Intrepid, and put some notes down on here. So far I’ve upgraded 3 webbook to intrepid, all of which have gone very smoothly.
If you live anywhere in the West Mids area, I would be willing to have a look at it for you. Also, may seem a trifle odd, but as using your 3 modem to connect, and apply updates, and are having problems, have you thought about trying one of the free wifi hotspots around, such as you’ll find at some McDonalds? A bit of a long shot I know, but if there are caching issues with 3’s proxy servers, you might get round the problems using the wifi hotspot, as this uses your wireless connection, and not your modem connection.
It’s worth a try.
Anyhow, let me know how you get on, I’m more than appy to help.
PS, It’s not just linux users that can have problems with updates, I’ve just had to sort out a friends XP pc, as after downloading service pack 3, the PC wouldn’t boot up normally !!
Hi Alison
Or, anybody else for that matter. I can provide support in the same way Alan does using X11vnc, but only at pre-arranged times, as I won’t have the facility running continuously.
But, it will allow a fresh pair of eyes to look.
x11vnc -connect tony-home.no-ip.org
It’s switched off at the moment, but I’ve tested it using my webbook connected using the usb modem.
Cheers
Many thanks for your kind offer of help, Tony – I live in the East Midlands. I was and am more than happy to stick with Hardy Heron as it will be supported until 2011 and I already have more complications than I bargained for.
The problems with Update Manager started immediately after I installed the Wader updates/upgrade on 29 October, just over a month after I bought my webbook. I don’t think these problems are connected with proxy servers in my case. I suspect that the duplicate source list (an original software error) that came to light last week (see Alan’s comment on Nov. 14 above) may have triggered a chain reaction in my particular operating system, whereas other webbook users have been luckier. (Maybe it’s like a faulty gene that causes health problems in some cases and not in others.)
With Firefox 3.0 reinstalled, I am stuck. (See: http://webbookblog.com/but-i-am-online/ 3 August 2008 ) I am clinging to the hope that Alan (?) might still be able to connect to my webbook, reinstall Firefox 3.1 and have another go at tackling the underlying problem with Update Manager which has obviously not been solved.
Otherwise I might have to fight it out with CPW/Elonex. (I don’t want Windows, I just want an Ubuntu webbook that works!!)
While I was typing this, your second comment appeared, Tony and I appreciate your offer of remote help. At the moment I am not even sure whether x11vnc will still work. In desperation I opened a terminal window last night and entered sudo apt-get update, but it failed to fetch everything, although I think I was still online (minus Firefox). I’ll see what works this evening, if possible, and post again tomorrow.
Hi Alison
If you still have trouble, the offer is there. although, tomorrow I’ll be in working Birmingham during the day, just leave a message on here with a time, and I’ll gladly have a look, or leave a message to say I’m not able to connect at the time.
Cheers
Sorry, me again.
Are you sure you had Firefox 3.1 installed? As the latest version I have installed via the update manager is 3.0.4, which is the latest stable release according to the Mozilla website, 3.1 is still beta (test) status, with no definite production version release date listed, but is unlikely to be much before the end of the year, if not early next.
Cheers
Hi Tony. Hi Alan too.
I meant Firefox 3.01, which as you say, Tony, has now been superseded by 3.04. 3.0 was definitely what my crazy Update Manager reinstalled yesterday, and as Alan pointed out on 3 August, version 3.0 didn’t recognise mobile broadband. Hence my inability to access the web last night.
On a more positive note at last -I am online again now! (I was posting from my workplace during the day.)
I still don’t understand why Update Manager has been behaving so oddly these last few days. Maybe I needed to run sudo apt-get update after Alan’s intervention on Friday.
When I switched on my webbook this evening I could not access the web via Firefox, but then I ran sudo apt-get update and for the first time the results looked encouraging:
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy Release.gpg
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy Release.gpg
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Translation-en_GB
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy Release.gpg
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Translation-en_GB
Get: 1 http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy Release [27.6kB]
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/main Translation-en_GB
Get: 2 http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy Release [27.6kB]
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/restricted Translation-en_GB
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Sources
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages
Ign http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Sources
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/universe Translation-en_GB
Hit http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/multiverse Translation-en_GB
Hit http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Sources
Get: 3 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates Release.gpg [189B]
Ign http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/main Translation-en_GB
Ign http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/restricted Translation-en_GB
Ign http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/universe Translation-en_GB
Ign http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/multiverse Translation-en_GB
Hit http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy Release
Hit http://ppa.launchpad.net hardy/main Sources
Get: 4 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates Release [58.5kB]
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/main Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/restricted Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/main Sources
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/restricted Sources
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/universe Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/universe Sources
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/multiverse Packages
Hit http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy/multiverse Sources
Get: 5 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/main Packages [381kB]
Get: 6 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/restricted Packages [7103B]
Get: 7 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/main Sources [101kB]
Get: 8 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/restricted Sources [1092B]
Get: 9 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/universe Packages [143kB]
Get: 10 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/universe Sources [33.7kB]
Get: 11 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/multiverse Packages [23.8kB]
Get: 12 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com hardy-updates/multiverse Sources [4020B]
Fetched 754kB in 22s (34.0kB/s)
Reading package lists… Done
Can it be true that simply entering sudo apt-get update (providing there are no error messages, of course) brings the system up to date (whereas it can sometimes take quite a long time to install packages via Update Manager)?
At any rate, after entering the magic formula I found that Firefox was working again, and looking at Help > About Mozilla Firefox hey presto! – version 3.04 was back.
I will now have to see whether the Automatic Updates start working again normally in the next few days…
Anyway, many thanks for your help, Alan and for your kind offer of help too, Tony. Maybe I will need to call on you in future… For now I am just keeping my fingers crossed…
this is great, I should have mentioned how the magic works with X11VNC, I simply run a listening VNC viewer and on my router I map port 5500 to my laptop. The computer doesn’t have to be a webbook, or running Linux for that matter. The cool thing about this is that the person who is stuck doesn’t need to know anything about their router settings or even their own IP address, all the complicated stuff is on the helper end.
Hi Alison,
I saw your link to this, where you mention having trouble updating, and from the note above I’m not clear if you sorted it or not.
Using ’sudo apt-get update’ _doesn’t_ bring your system up-to-date, it just updates the list of packages and versions it knows about. After running that you should run ’sudo apt-get upgrade’. That will come back and tell you how many packages will be installed, upgraded, or ‘held-back’, and wait for you to confirm the upgrade. If some packages are ‘held-back’ you can also try ’sudo apt-get dist-upgrade’ which will upgrade the distribution version if available.
Hope that’s helpful.
Hi Alison
Glad to hear you’re back online. Jim is correct, in that running sudo apt-get update, does just update the list of packages available to your system. You shouldn’t, all being well, need to use the command line again to get you upto date, just the Update Manager as normal.
If you do have any other problems, don’t hesitate to drop a message on here.
Cheers
Many thanks for your comments, Jim.
I submitted my previous comment last night and as it had not appeared on the blog by lunch time today I also submitted a slightly revised version, adding a few further thoughts and questions (that has not appeared).
What I want to AVOID at all costs is instructing my system to upgrade from Hardy Heron (8.04) to Intrepid Ibex (8.11)!! I want to stick with Hardy Heron.
I am still not quite clear how I just install all the relevant Automatic Updates to Hardy Heron that I may have missed. Could you (or Alan) please clarify that point?
This was my main additional question: How do I find out whether my system is REALLY up-to-date and how can I tell whether the updates I am being offered by Update Manager are really the correct ones? I must have missed quite a few updates since Update Manager stopped working around October 29 ……
At this point I am not sure whether the Automatic Updates are going to start working properly again or not…
To avoid displaying personal details on this blog, I was also wondering whether Alan could maybe keep (and when appropriate pass on) the contact details of kind people like Tony (above) who have expertise in Ubuntu Linux admin. and who would be willing to share the burden of helping novice webbook users like me resolve their problems?
Hi Alison,
If you look at your webbook menu and select ‘System->Administration->Software Sources’ it will ask for your password, then select the ‘Updates’ tab. At the bottom of the form is a ‘Release upgrade’ section, and if you select the ‘Never’ option it will ignore new versions of Ubuntu.
I’d do the apt-get update again, but you should be ok after that using the update icon.
Good luck
Hi Alison, your comments were held in the moderation queue because they contained lots of links, I released one and delete the other two, sorry I didn’t notice they were different. When an update happens it picks up all available updates. You can go to system-Administration-Update manager and it should tell you your system is up to date. You can force it to check again for updates if you don’t believe it.
as the others pointed out the graphical update manager combines both the command line “apt-get update” and “apt-get upgrade” commands, checking for updates is ‘update’ and downloading and installing is ‘upgrade’
that is an interesting question about contact details. Generally I think issues are best sorted out on the web in public, that way everyone gets to benefit from the answer (and anyone who disagrees with an answer offered is free to chime in). I am quite privacy aware and would not pass on anyone’s contact details without asking them first.
Alan, I was not suggesting that you pass on anyone’s contact details without their consent! However, if remote support via X11vnc were involved – as offered by Tony -, then it would be important to be able to contact the person providing it, by email at least. A major problem for non-expert webbook users is the fact that people with expertise in Ubuntu Linux system admin. are very thin on the ground. The Geek Squad don’t know the first thing about it! That places a heavy burden on your shoulders.
By the way, I installed 6 automatic updates last night (hplip and python stuff) and I am hoping that running sudo apt-get update for a second time on Tuesday following your surgical intervention last Friday did the trick. I am just waiting to see if all continues to go well in the next few days, so as not to rejoice too soon, as I have done in the past…
I am sure there must be a chronological list or schedule of (Hardy etc) Updates online somewhere that one could consult. It would also be interesting to find out a bit more about the various updates, most of which flash past without one really knowing what they are.
I still have lots of questions about Ubuntu, some of which I am gradually finding the answers to…This recent experience has at least helped me to overcome some of my initial fear of ‘invoking the terminal’….
Hi Alan & All
I don’t mind my email contact details being made available to those who ask, such as Alison, I’m always happy to help when and where I can, bearing in mind I also have a fulltime job.
Cheers
And to all,
As a linux newbie, I can’t offer much. Although I am learning pretty quick…
What I can offer is common sense, and an objective logical mind. I’ll usually post to anything I find interesting, or that I think I can help out with.
I agree with Alan, the more problems we solve on this blog, the less often those same problems will be re-asked. Being totally in favour of Open Source, I say we should be encouraging everybody to chip-in with their two-pence worth!
Help me Alan!
i am having some serous problems with my update manager, every time i switch on my webbook i am confronted by some necessary updates, even if i am not connected to the web.
secondly, when i then try to donwload and install all the updates i am confronted by an error message reading as follows:
“E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run ‘dpkg –configure -a’ to correct the problem.
E: _cache->open() failed, please report.”
there is no way of removing this message, i have tried filing with the updater settings and tried only installing some of the updates to see if there was a problem with a particular update, but with no avail.
any advice that you could offer on this problem would be wonderful.
thanks,
Joseph ohalloran
ok, lets start by doing what it suggests, close any update manager or Synaptic windows and go to Applications-Accessories-Terminal. When that opens type in
sudo dpkg –configure -aand hit return, it will then ask for your password. Let me know what it says next. Hopefully it will fix whatever the problem is and you will be able to use the update manager again. I think there is room for a bit more resilience to be built in to update manager.Hi Alan, thank again for the help.
i did already try that once and i got a load of information that i did not understand.
The following is the response that i got from the terminal window;
joseph@ubuntu:~$ sudo dpkg –configure -a
dpkg: need an action option
Type dpkg –help for help about installing and deinstalling packages [*];
Use `dselect’ or `aptitude’ for user-friendly package management;
Type dpkg -Dhelp for a list of dpkg debug flag values;
Type dpkg –force-help for a list of forcing options;
Type dpkg-deb –help for help about manipulating *.deb files;
Type dpkg –license|–licence for copyright licence and lack of warranty (GNU GPL) [*].
Options marked [*] produce a lot of output – pipe it through `less’ or `more’ !
joseph@ubuntu:~$
I’m afraid this is a little too tricky for me to do remedy on my own, so i think I’m gonna need some help on this one.
What do you think?
thanks in advance,
Joseph
hi Alan,
i have tried and tried with this problem with my update manager but still have no joy, any more ideas?
“E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run ‘dpkg –configure -a’ to correct the problem.
E: _cache->open() failed, please report.”
thank you pal,
joe